


Getting Back to Eddie

by vanillafluffy



Category: Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Gen, Hurt Eddie Brock, Involuntary Hosts, POV Venom Symbiote (Marvel), Protective Venom Symbiote (Marvel), Rescue, Rescue Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-17 21:57:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18973411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vanillafluffy/pseuds/vanillafluffy
Summary: After a crash on the bike, Venom is ejected from Eddie and has to figure out a way to save him. The rescue mission makes for some strange bedfellows.





	Getting Back to Eddie

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cozy_coffee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cozy_coffee/gifts).



> The theme was crack and the prompt was "Venom gets trapped in the body of a hedgehog"...it ended up being a porcupine (apparently hedgehogs aren't native to North America) and a lot less cracked than you'd expect from the prompt. But it was fun!

There is too much oxygen--Venom can’t breathe. Where is Eddie? They’d been on the motorcycle and now he is massed on the ground. Eddie and the bike are nowhere to be seen. 

He must find his Eddie, but first he needs a host or he’ll die. There’s something nearby, small and warm-blooded. Venom inches his way toward it. He isn’t sure what the creature is--it’s roughly the same size he is, but it has sharp fur that prickles him as he rolls over it as if it’s covered in flexible spears. Venom approves.

Its vision isn’t too good, but its sense of smell and hearing are excellent. In a moment, he’s located Eddie and the bike. The trouble is, they’re stuck in a tree at least twenty feet in the air. 

Venom wasn’t paying attention to the road; he’d burrowed happily into Eddie as they returned from covering a story in Sacramento. Eddie either lost control of the bike or fell asleep and ran off the road, ending up aloft in the branches of one of the big trees lining the sloping road. Venom was ejected during the crash and he needs to get back to Eddie, make sure he’s okay and get him out of there.

There’s no way to get to him; Venom doesn’t have the stamina to climb a tree without a host. Even if this whatever-it-is could climb a tree--which he’s reasonably sure it can’t--it’s much too small and weak to help Eddie. Its sharp fur would probably hurt him--that’s out of the question.

He needs to find another human host, fast.

Sharp-fur knows a human place…it doesn’t go there often--it isn’t welcome, but it’s nearby. Venom gets the little creature moving as quickly as it can in that direction. Venom wants to go home--he wants his Eddie!--and this creature is the only way to make that happen. There’s a wire fence…he scuttles under it, although Sharp-fur is alarmed. Timid thing. It isn’t like Eddie, it doesn’t really think, it can’t plan--it merely reacts to circumstances. 

A floppy-earred hound dog runs up, barking. Venom fights Sharp-fur’s impulse to defend itself. He waits until the beast is close, sniffing at his temporary host, then he surges forward, possessing the hound. Sharp-fur hits the dog in the face with its barbed hairs and jumps away from its target. 

Ow! That freaking hurts! Venom echoes the dog’s snarl, but he has enough sense not to attack. Sharp-fur waddles back toward the fence and is soon out of sight.

Okay. There’s a house in the distance. That’s where his newest host lives. Venom tries to figure out who he’s riding now…Good boy, Bad dog! and Damn fool dog! all mill around in the hound’s brain. Then he hears a call from across the field, “Bubba! Where the hell are you?”

Bubba is much faster than Sharp-fur. Venom gallops toward the man calling him, worried about Eddie, perched precariously in that tree. The man gets a look at him and says, “You tangled with another porcupine?! You damn fool--”

He doesn’t get to finish the sentence, since Venom has the hound leap up, planting his paws on the man’s chest so he can easily transfer to his third host in the last half-hour.

Bubba sniffs curiously at him, but Venom has no time to stop for a snack. Eddie has been coaching him on manners, but he doesn’t much care about getting acquainted with Carter Dunphee, known to Bubba as Food Man. He has a truck, which is just what Venom needs. He scouts the contents of the vehicle, pillages the barn and loads everything he sees that might be useful.

The dog jumps into the bed of the truck and Venom puts Carter into the cab, starts it up and heads toward the road where Eddie is stranded.

Getting back to Eddie’s tree doesn’t take long, but finding a way to maneuver the truck close enough takes a worrying amount of time. Venom is alarmed by the fact that Eddie doesn’t seem to have moved. He wants to scream Eddie’s name, but restrains himself--he hates to think of what could happen if Eddie started and fell out of the tree, perhaps with the Ducati landing on top of him…no, he has to use this new host to save the one he prefers above all others.

Carter Dunphee is fit and strong. Venom climbs up to the crash site with ease.

Eddie’s eyes are closed. There’s blood on his face. He doesn’t seem to be aware of where he is or of Venom’s absence. But he _is_ alive! He’s breathing slowly and deeply, so Venom is sure he can heal any injuries when he returns to him.

First, they need to get him out of the tree. Working swiftly, Venom rigs a pulley from a heavy rope and uses hay-hooks to lift the bike, Eddie and all off the branch they’re perched on. Carter’s truck pulls the bike free from its nest…Venom goes to look at it, suspended in the air.

Yes, it’s been drawn clear of the branch beneath it. Now all he needs to do is reverse the vehicle and lower them gently to the forest floor.

As soon as the bike touches down, Venom throws the truck into ‘Park’ and runs to check on Eddie. 

Leaving Carter for Eddie feels like coming home, like Eddie reaching for his favorite jeans and saying he’s going to slip into something comfortable. 

_EDDIE! Eddie-Eddie-Eddie-Eddie-Eddie! EDDIE!_

“Wuh?” Eddie’s eyes flutter open. He stares at Carter in confusion. Clearly, he has no clue what’s going on.

“Are you okay, mister? You and your bike were stuck up in that tree--”

“I was?” Eddie looks over toward the tree, scrapes on the bark showing where the motorcycle had been lodged. “I must have fallen asleep and gone off the road--” He yawns.

“I’m just glad I could help.” Carter says awkwardly. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“It’s lucky you came along when you did. It’s almost sundown, It’s a good thing I didn’t have to spend all night up there.”

“It was really weird,” Carter confides. “My dog got nailed by a porcupine…I was gonna take him to the vet, but I started putting stuff in the truck--the rope and the hay-hooks and everything. It was like I couldn’t help myself. I didn’t know why then, but when we drove down the road there you were.” He shakes his head, bemused. “I have no idea how I managed to get up there and secure the bike. It was like…some of those stories you see where people say angels came to their rescue. I think maybe I had heavenly help.”

Eddie figures it out, then. Venom hears grateful thoughts. “You’re right,” Eddie agrees. “I think there _is_ an other-worldly explanation--but I really appreciate your help.”

“There’s a motel about two miles up the road,” Carter points. “You slept through a crash like that, you should definitely go catch some shut-eye. I can follow you, if you want a spotter, I’m going that way any how. Have to go get those quills out of Bubba’s face, poor damn fool dog.”

“Thanks, I’ll take you up on that,” Eddie yawns and kick-starts the bike. 

He’s very tired, but Venom can tell there’s nothing wrong with him that more sleep won’t cure. And maybe the motel will have food or at least access to pizza delivery, since Bubba isn’t on the menu. Maybe Eddie’s lessons in manners are working after all.

…


End file.
